Solace
by Raven Shinobi
Summary: ShionAdult Jr. A oneshot where Shion and the grown up version of Jr. are the only travelers in the eternal journey. Takes place hundreds of years after the end of ep. III.


**Disclaimer: the Xenosaga franchise is not my property.**

**A/N: This is an adult Jr./Shion fic that takes place after the end of the game. I don't know whether or not Shion and the others were traveling near light speed when they were heading for Lost Jerusalem, but in this fic they didn't undergo time dilation, which makes the circumstances in this fic possible. **

**If there were official word about them traveling near light speed, then you could consider this fic semi-AU.**

**Hope you enjoy.**

* * *

**Solace**

_Days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, millennia…_

_The flow of time didn't matter in the perpetual darkness of space, especially to those who wouldn't age past this very day..._

His life force had been restored as a result of the spiritual fusion between him and his separated white other half. The dissipation of the terror that U-DO had wrecked within him all his life up until hundreds of years ago had rendered needless the inhibitor that he had sealed his physical development with to contain the red winged beast within him that resonated antithetically with his anti-existence. It all enabled him to live as long as the celestial bodies that decorated the obsidian walls of the vast universe around them.

With his heart clenching at the reminder to his longevity, he turned in his bed towards the stars and planets that the ship passed by that were displayed on the fluorescent screen on the windowless wall on his right; careful not to disturb the peaceful slumber of the delicate creature in his arms. It was then when he finally fathomed the fear and anxiety that was eating at Albedo's heart like ravenous piranhas back then when they were still children. It was the fear of watching as they aged and eventually died while he remained alive and kicking his comrades, his friends, his family, whom volunteered to aid them in their mission to search for the seeming impossible without questioning their sanity or capability like others did before they left the Dämmerung into the abyss of space.

His eyes shut in lamentation; those scenes from his memory of seeing the soul of each one of them off were more horrifying than staring death in the eye in the numerous near-death experiences that he had gone through.

As that soft moan that reverberated from her throat tickled his hearing, he smiled down at her with fondness as he ran his fingers through her disheveled chestnut locks. He wasn't quite sure whether it had to do with her being the maiden, or because an early death will only result in disturbing the balance of the universe because of the grave task that she had been given from the avatars of chaos and order. Nevertheless, here she was, as youthful as the day he had laid his eyes upon her when their paths crossed centuries ago.

He tightened his embrace around her. There were times in his accursed past when he wished for his tormented soul to be among the dead to atone beyond the grave for the sin that he had committed against his brothers and twin. However, the dear woman clutched against his chest made him realize the purpose to why he had been fated to elude death too many times: because he was destined to love her and protect her until she had fulfilled the covenant that she had made to their friends.

"Jr.?"

His head that was placed atop hers shifted at the groggy call.

"What time is it?" She inquired rubbing the sleepiness off her eyes.

He turned his head on the pillow to check the glaring red numbers on the bedside clock on his side of the bed, "seven in the morning."

The time on the Elsa was still adjacent to the former, nonexistent capital of their galaxy that they were currently beyond its boundaries: Fifth Jerusalem. He wondered almost every time he checked the time what the others could be doing in the opposite side of the universe at that moment. Was Old Man still around?

_"Of course not, his joints were already old and rusty even before we left. I'd wager the most he was able to survive before hitting the bucket is a handful of decades._"

He also wondered at times with a nostalgic smile about little MOMO. He hoped that her memories were passed onto her progeny so they would remember him when he gives them a pat on the head when they reunite on Lost Jerusalem like they had promised.

Without further ado, Shion immediately flung over the covers and slipped her chemise-clad form out of his embrace to slip her feet into the fluffy slippers waiting beneath her. Jr.'s sapphire eyes followed her trek towards the adjoining bathroom with her stopping momentarily by a shelf toppled with two framed photographs to offer her daily prayers to each of the two children displayed in each one of them. He felt his heart clench with grief as he listened to her uttering their names with melancholy that contrasted with the warmth of the smile upon her face.

"Good morning, Suou and Maria."

Suou was the son that she had with Allen at the beginning of their journey, christened after the father that she found about his bottomless love and devotion for his family after it was already too late to mend the ruined bridges between them, and Maria was...

_Their daughter..._

The sound of running water that emanated from behind the electric door of the bathroom intermingling with the humming of the ship's engines. Jr.'s half-dressed figure got off the bed and walked over to pick up the picture of the child that was a perfect replica of her lovely mother, save for the blue, cat-like eyes that he had passed on to her. She was sitting on his lap with his wife seated on their right with her head resting on his shoulder; the little realian friend that Shion had built for her that their little girl had named Alice was seated on their left in the mess room of the Elsa, in front of a birthday cake. Sorrowful unshed tears glazed his eyes as he pressed the picture against his heart that wept lamentably...

_It all happened immediately after the last one of their companions had fallen under the strain of the limit of their mortal body, and the two of them became the only passengers in this ship that had yet to cross the border of their home galaxy. He watched with concern as mournful tears failed to reach her eyes, though it was her son's aged body that lied motionlessly on his deathbed. He supposed back then that having witnessed again and again the scene of life abandoning the flesh of her friends and loved one had rendered the pain of loss too familiar to fuss over it, or that crying just didn't cut it for this seemingly never-ending tragedy._

_After the brief funeral, she immediately carried on with her duties, pretending with a somberness that she couldn't douse off her eyes as though nothing had ever occurred, which made him all the more worried and at a loss at that time how he should deal with it. Finally, he begrudgingly decided to play along and too act as though nothing had ever happened despite how much he wanted to pull her to his embrace and implore her to wail to her heart's content. Eventually, when he couldn't anymore stomach her silent mourning, he crushed her to his chest; and under the effect of the hand squeezing her body and caressing her hair, she washed his shirt with hot tears until the emotional exhaustion lulled her to sleep in his embrace._

_In the next day during his shift in the bridge, he found her through the surveillance monitor dismantling one of the drones. His immediate inquiry through the microphone that resonated with utter concern that she wasn't over her sorrow yet was met with laughter at his evident panicked state. She then reassured him, not breaking her eyes from what her hands were busy with, that the place was beginning to feel a bit lonely and they were going to need more staff anyway to carry on with this journey. And viewing how engrossed and enjoyed she seemed to be with this new task, he proclaimed with finality that he will be the one in charge of navigating the ship until she finished putting together the new personnel; inwardly vowing to himself that he would do everything in his power to keep that genuine smile on her face._

_And feeling that obligation was what ignited the devotion towards her in his heart that later on gave rise to other unprecedented sentiments. Unlike those associated with the innocent love that he had felt for Sakura, or the brotherly protectiveness that he felt towards MOMO as he kept checking on her out of concern every hour and the next through the monitor. It made him feel like a peeping Tom, as his smothered eyes would involuntarily draw closer to the screen whenever she tetchily flipped her hair that had accumulated on her front, which would give a tantalizing view of her long neck and her earring-adorned ears. And whenever she stretched like a feline, which would cause the seam line of her breasts to peek through her neckline, accompanied by that soft moan, his body would abnormally grow hot. _

_As the tense sensation ebbs, he chastises himself with a shake of his head as he switches the channel. But no matter how many times he reminded himself that he was treading on her privacy and that he shouldn't view her that way, it kept recurring to the point of him rushing under the freezing coldness of the overhead shower spray to extinguish the exigencies of his lascivious tendencies before they break out of his reins. And every time as his heated body slams back against the cold ceramic wall of the shower, his mind goes over the factors that originated this unprecedented carnal lust for the soft curves of a woman pressing against his hard muscular form._

_Albedo once teased him after he inwardly conferred this ordeal with him that it was possibly due to his instinctive needs as a man that rose with his rabid growth and her being the only woman aboard that could fulfill them. As much as that deduction offended the friend in him toward her, it sounded the only plausible explanation. He also remembered his brother releasing that maniacal laugh that he last time heard in The Song of Nephilim when he got an accidental peek at his dreamful visions when she appears next to him in his bed, followed by them drowning in the physical and emotional warmth that they grant the other without restraint._

_In the end with neither Shelly or Mary being around to consult the matter with, and with his less informed brother who only had experience in dealing with the opposite sex through venting on them his pent-up sadistic notions towards Sakura, he ended up gradually distancing himself from her. He should've known it wouldn't prove to be effective in the end, considering that it was easy that he would be missed since he was now the only other living being in this ship. And in the end of the second day, she confronted him irately regarding his perplexing sudden withdrawal, followed shortly by him tentatively confronting back after she sternly insisted on him to spit it out._

_Shock and then awkwardness ensued as she held her lowered temple as her body slowly lowered down to sit on his bed. He didn't know how much time had passed as he waited for the torturous silence that felt longer than the eternity they had lived until now to end, as he watched out of the corner of his eyes her hung head and her parted lips that were in loss for words. Finally, he heard her finally verbalize:_

_"Then go ahead, fulfill those fantasies to your heart's content."_

_That unexpected statement paralyzed him as he stood there, sapphire eyes widening as they followed her body movement as she lifted her feet on the bed. He exclaimed indignantly once his agape mouth found his voice as he averted his eyes embarrassedly, "Shion, I can't possibly-"_

_"Is there any other woman around I don't know of that I can hook you up with?" She interjected with slight sarcasm._

_**"I wouldn't have thought about it too much if it were some girl I don't know!" **__He retorted heatedly, __**"I can't possibly stomach the idea of degrading you of all people and use your body as an outlet for my selfish whims!" **_

_**"And I can't possibly stomach the idea of the only friend that I have left avoiding me like some plague!" **__She retorted back as she got off and took his hands to drag him atop her, __**"you have no idea how boring and painfully lonely it gets at the end of the day!"**_

_As she lay beneath him on the bed, his unfocused eyes looked down with uncertainty. He was finally being offered what he had been dreaming of for countless of nights on a silver platter. But being beneath him the woman he respected and cared for the most, that he swore he would make her happy and never hurt her, the irony of this awkward situation added all the more to his reluctance._

_Getting tired of the interminable hesitation in his demeanor, Shion decided to take the initiative as she abruptly grabbed the back of his neck to crush his lips against hers. It took the inexperienced man sometime to get over his initial surprise and reciprocate with receding restraint until his bottled-up lust erupted and took over. As her lips parted for oxygen, his own moved down to her neck, tracing with every button he urgently unbuttoned a trail down to her belly button. After he was done tickling the sensitive spot with his tongue, he was consumed by the unbridled urge to taste again the aphrodisiacal amalgam of their interlocked lips as they amidst their intoxication began stripping the other to the last article._

_After that night, their intimate activities that were to his befuddlement mostly instigated by her kept recurring to the point of him being invited to move in permanently to the once forbidden girls' room that she remodeled. She must've thought it won't settle well with him occupying the conjugal nest that the late Allen and her once shared._

_He didn't know at that time whether her attraction to him was merely incited by the unadulterated, carnal lust that only he could fulfill being the only male around. He wondered if it could be that she found in his nearness late at night a semblance of solace that kept her from losing her resolve to accomplish this journey that seemingly would take an eternity. Could it be that his he what kept her from slipping into the abyss of madness amidst the icy loneliness that engulfed the place after everyone was gone? _

_Whatever it was, it all had led to the family that renewed his value for his existence and finally gave him a taste of true happiness and the peace of mind that he had been missing all his life._

As he heard the whishing sound of the bathroom door, he placed the picture back on the shelf and watched as his wife stepped out with a towel wrapped around her slim body. He looked her over with a flirtatious smile that met hers as she gave him a smack on the rear that signaled his turn.

* * *

"How's our course?"

Shion closed an eye as she felt warmth against her sleeved arm and looked up to find her husband as he handed her her afternoon coffee. She accepted it smiling gratefully as she displayed the map that Dr. Mizrahi gave them that indicated humanity's trail over the past thousands of years and filled in with a finger pointing at each mentioned location. "We are almost two Julian years from Fourth Jerusalem. Fortunately, according to the map there are several terraformed planetary ruins which we can anchor in and gather supplies."

She then sighed tiredly as she sat back, "hundreds of years and we've managed to reach as far as this, not to mention this map only covers up to Neo Jerusalem. From there onward, we are on our own to find our way to Lost Jerusalem. It may take way more than what took the Immigrant Fleet from the time they left Earth to the time they called it home on Neo Jerusalem."

"Don't worry Shion," one of the realians who she named Akio exclaimed blithely from the pilot seat, "the power of friendship is gonna guide us through it all, I'm sure of it!"

Shion chuckled, "you sound just like someone I knew," and sighed reminiscently "he used to say the cheesiest things to lift your spirit up!"

Jr. smiled despite the jealousy that consumed him as he realized whom she was talking about. As he wordlessly turned around to climb on the chair that the late captain Matthews once used to bark orders from he heard a voice stating above a whisper.

"As long as you're with me, Jr., I know I will be able to make it. Please stay by my side, always."

He reassured as his seat began to lift off the ground, "even if you got tired of me and asked me to leave, I will always remain by your side. Your burden is also my own."

"Thank you!"

He heard her state wanly; he didn't need to look at her face to know that the tears glazed her eyes as she tried to swallow that lump in her throat. It's been hundreds of years full of lamentation and tears of blood for the dear ones they've lost. The hope and the covenant that they one day will meet with those whom they parted with in the past that they can never let go of kept them going onward despite the pain of loss that can never dissipate.

Once they reach Lost Jerusalem, he was going to give Shion the family that the both of them longed for, so they both can put this life behind them and move on to the next one.


End file.
